Other Souls 2
by Synaid
Summary: Twenty years after third impact, old patterns begin to repeat. Chapter 3 is up, SYNC TEST FROM HELL!!! (Ongoing Story)
1. 1

**_Other Souls 2_**

By Synaid

v. 1.32

10/1/01

**Dedicated to:** My mother. I know, I know, there's parts in here you didn't like or wouldn't have put in, stuff you didn't think was necessary, but I still love you anyway! And see, I took out the song too!

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Eva, Gainax does I think. If I owned Eva, I wouldn't be writing fanfic of it! Instead, I'd probably be writing Gundam Wing fanfic or something...

**Author's Notes:** Special thanks to all those who put up with my emails and for not kicking me when I asked for proofreaders. Speaking of which, if any of you would like to volunteer to proofread the next chapter, just ask! Anyway, this is set about twenty years after third impact, enjoy!

**2035 Tokyo-3 Ruins**

"I FIXED IT!" A child that couldn't have been a minute over fifteen popped into what might have once been a computer room. She had dark red hair and emerald eyes. Her face was smudged with a substance that might have been blood, had it not been orange in color. She was dressed in a white lab coat that covered the brown utility uniform she wore underneath, though both were covered in the orange sticky substance, along with soot and dust among other things.

"No way!" A boy clunked his head on the desk he was working under when he tried to sit up too fast. He had hair like milk chocolate and dazzling dark blue eyes. He was dressed in a simple white t-shirt with slightly in style jeans (the pockets turned inside out). "How could you have? That thing went offline years ago!"

"My Mom worked on it! Anything she can do, I know I can do better!"

"Hey, Dr. Akagi worked on the Magi, but she didn't even make it, your grandmother did! My mother and father and Aunt Rei both got to pilot Evas!"

"Yes, they did. Would you stop driving the point home?" Another girl, blue haired and crimson eyed, was crouched on the counter the boy had been working under. A piece of dry toast hung from her mouth as she absently munched on it. Her voice was slightly muffled by the toast. "I swear, Sohn, if I hear about that again, I'm going to be forced to hurt you. All our parents where there, ok!"

"Ok, ok Nagisa." The boy, Sohn, held his hands up defensively. "I'm sorry!"

"Is that your response to everything?" The blue haired girl, Nagisa, flung a slice of jam covered toast at him. With an incredible show of dexterity, he snatched it out of the air and started munching on it.

"You two fight like siblings." Yuriko Akagi, daughter of Ritsuko Akagi, shook her head at the two of them. Though she was older than both by more than a year, the three had always been together, in _their_ minds at least.

"We-" Sohn Ikari suddenly stopped by Nagisa Ayanami shoving another piece of toast in his mouth.

"Cousins. Just cousins." She said.

"Ummm… right…" Yuriko uncomfortably adjusted her lab coat, looking back and forth between her two best friends. Family relationships were always a delicate subject with these two. "So you guys wanna go see it?"

"Hell yeah!" Nagisa jumped from the counter and bolted pass Yuriko, almost spinning the other girl around. As Yuriko struggled to get her balance, Sohn darted by, grabbing her wrist and yanking her down the hallway.

"Come on, Yuriko!" Sohn shouted over his shoulder.

"Damn it, Sohn! It's not like the damn thing is going anywhere! It's been there for almost thirty years now!"

"It's not the Magi I'm worried about! It's Nagisa! I hate it when she beats me anywhere!"

"ARGH!" Yuriko Akagi yelled in frustration, as she was whipped around a corner. "YOU TWO ARE NEVER GOING TO GROW UP!!!"

***

"Wow… They look…" Sohn grasped for a word to properly express his feelings.

"Lifeless." Nagisa supplied.

"I was going to use 'like a pile of junk,' but lifeless works." Sohn grinned at his cousin.

"Guuuuyyyys!" Yuriko whined, desperately trying to boot her monitor up. "It was working just a few minutes ago!"

"Riiiiight." Both of her friends said in unison.

"Damnit." Yuriko slammed her palm against the computer. "I've worked on you for weeks! Come on, come on, please work!" A sudden sputtering of sparks from the laptop was her only reward for her efforts. She sighed and leaned back, glaring at the traitorous piece of equipment. "Ok, once again!" She attacked the keyboard with both hands.

Nagisa snagged Sohn's sleeves and gave a tug. When he swiveled his head around to yell at his cousin, she put a finger to her lips and shook her head. She tilted it to the side a little, indicating for the two of them to step back.

"What is it, Nagisa?" He asked, keeping his voice low so Yuriko wouldn't hear them.

"How… how have you been?"

"What do you mean?" Sohn put on his most confident face.

"You know what I mean." Nagisa piercing crimson gaze cut through Sohn's mask. Sohn sighed, his shoulder drooping.

"I'll be fine… It's dad I'm worried about. He hasn't shown any signs of caring about anything. Not me, not work, nothing. I mean, we've been here for three days now, and he hasn't called me on the cell phone once." He pulled the fully charged phone out of his pocket and looked sadly at it. "Mom gave it to me, you know. In case anything ever… happened…" He sniffed slightly, his eyes starting to tear up. "I… I miss…"

Nagisa could see her cousin starting to break. She wrapped her arms around him, putting his head on her shoulder. "It's ok, Sohn, it's ok…"

"I miss her so much, Nagisa!" He clutched at Nagisa, like a lost little boy grabbing onto a strangers leg for help. "Why, mother? Why did you have to die!"

Yuriko was startled by the outburst and looked back over her shoulder. The sight would have been unbelievable to someone twenty years ago, for it appeared that a fifteen year old Rei Ayanami was comforting Shinji Ikari. But to Yuriko it was just one of her friends comforting the other. Yuriko stood, her knees popping, and walked over to her best friends, wrapping her longer arms around both of them. "We're here for you, Sohn. We'll always be here for you."

For a while they just stood there, holding each other and waiting for Sohn's sobs to die down. Once the waves had ebbed, Sohn backed away from his friends. He looked at the two of them, getting ready to thank them for caring when he started laughing.

"What?" Yuriko looked at Nagisa who had an equally puzzled look on her pale face.

"Nothing, it's nothing." Sohn pushed the giggles down and shook his head. He blinked his eyes several times, trying to get rid of the excess tears. "So, did you get it working?"

"Na. I got the munchies." Yuriko shrugged.

"Yeah, got to feed those growing breast!" Nagisa grinned as Sohn went bright red and Yuriko sputtered.

"Y- y- you're completely perverted!" Yuriko shouted. "I'm going to kill you!"

"She's j- just teasing!" Sohn stammered. Trying to get between Yuriko and Nagisa. Nagisa wasn't helping as she was sticking her tongue out at the older girl. "She only does it because you go so ballistic."

"I'm still going to kill her!"

"Cut it… OUT!" Sohn shoved between them, putting a palm on either of their chests and shoving them apart. For a moment he just stood there, getting ready to berate them both.

"Sohn…" Nagisa interrupted the killer speech Sohn was formulating in his mind. "Could you take your hands off our breast?" 

"I… I…. Oh God! I'm sorry!" He shouted, yanking his hands back, his face going as blood red as Nagisa's eyes.

"Ok, so where are we going to go?" Yuriko cut through her embarrassment quicker than Sohn did his. "We're out of food here, unless you like toast." 

"I like toast!" Nagisa spoke up.

"Yes, we know you like-" Yuriko started to say but was interrupted by Nagisa again.

"I really like toast."

"Yes, we know you like-" Yuriko started again.

"Toast is the answer to all things!"

"Yes, toast. Now if we could-"

"YEAH, TOAST!

"Nagisa…"

"You are not worthy of the toast!"

"Ok, Nagisa, you can stop now.

"The toast shall clean the world of all infidels!"

"You've gotten to talk about toast, now let's-"

"Look to the toast! The toast has all the answers!"

"SHUT UP! OR I'M GOING TO _TOAST_ YOU!" Yuriko shouted. Sohn was desperately trying not to laugh as Nagisa just looked, straight faced, at Yuriko.

"We can go to my place." Sohn finally got through his gritted teeth, his arms still holding his shaking sides. "The food that's there shouldn't have gone bad. Besides, I need to check on dad anyway."

"Ok, let's head out to the car and-"

"FRENCH TOAST! French toast is evil!" Nagisa shouted.

"AAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!!!!!!" Yuriko roared in frustration and leaped, hands out stretched, at Nagisa. The blue haired babe made a beeline for the door and bolted down the hallway. "GET BACK HERE, YOU ANNOYING INSECT!" Yuriko was after Nagisa in an instant.

Sohn stood alone in what was once NERV headquarters, glancing around the dimly lit room of mythic proportions. "And she says _I_ act childish." He sighed and followed the screeching out of the room.

Left alone and by themselves, the trinity of super computers once known as the Magi hummed to life.

***

"AAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!! We're all gonna die!" Nagisa was hanging half out of the car's passenger side window. She had as many seat belts wrapped around her as she could, and even a rope tethering her lower regions to her seat. "Save the children! Get off the sidewalks! Lock your doors! Do anything you can to save yourselves! YURIKO'S DRIVING!!!!"

"Allow me to remind you, Nagisa, of the fact that I am more than a year older than either you or Sohn, and thus am the only one old enough to drive?" Yuriko hated driving this car anyway. Technically, it wasn't really hers. It belonged to her mother who had kept it after a dear friend, Misato Katsuragi, had died.

"WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!"

"Someone's gonna die, but it's not going to be because of my lack of driving skills!"

"Guys, could you cut it out? I'd like to make it home in one piece." Sohn sat in the back of the cramped outdated sports car. Yuriko turned all the way around in the driver's seat to glare at Sohn.

"Are you making fun of my driving too?"

"THE ROAD! WATCH THE ROAD!" Sohn shouted. Yuriko whipped around in time to see that she'd just blown through a red light.

***

"Home again, home again." Sohn pressed his thumb to the plate beside the door, waiting for it to read his thumbprint and scan his DNA. The door slid open and the three friends stepped into the cramped dirty living quarters of the Ikari household. The smell of cooking bacon and eggs wafted to the three teenagers. All three of their stomachs growled at the smell alone, it having been almost a week since they'd had any hot meal besides toast. As one, they darted down the cramped hallway and into the kitchen.

A woman with brown hair pulled back into a ponytail stood over the stove, frying eggs. The bacon was already done and setting on the table. She was wearing a yellow and blue sundress covered by an apron. Her back was turned to them so they couldn't see her face. She was humming a soft song Sohn had often heard his father hum while cooking.

"Ex- excuse me? Why are you-?"

"The bacons on the table. Help yourselves. The eggs are almost done." Her voice was muffled slightly. Given the crunch that occurred after she'd finished talking, the children guessed that she was eating one of the "egg sandwiches" Sohn's father liked so much. The sandwich consisted of a fried egg, lots of pepper, between two slices of toast. The only other person besides his father who ate them, to the children's knowledge anyway, was Nagisa.

"Who… who are you?" Sohn asked as the three took their customary seats.

"Friend of your father's." There was a slight giggle and again the voice was muffled, a crunch following the sentence. 

A chime above the refrigerator alerted them to the fact that someone was coming threw the front door. Whoever it was sniffed the air and came down the hallway and towards the kitchen just as the trio had. The woman spoke before she entered the kitchen though.

"Yui?"

The woman cooking turned around as she slid the last egg onto a platter. She blinked in surprise, looking at the dark haired older woman in the doorway.

"Naoko?" She asked. There was a sound at the only other doorway into the kitchen. Both women and the children turned to see a man with a three-day beard and tinted glasses. He'd apparently been standing there when the older woman came in.

"Gendo?" Both women said in unison.

For a moment, three people who might have been ghost from a generation ago simply stood staring at each other. The three children who might have been echoes of Rei Ayanami, Shinji Ikari and Ritsuko Akagi were struck by the oddity of the frozen moment. The moment seemed to last forever and yet end in an instant.

"I'm going to go shave!" The man turned and left the kitchen.

"Hey Shinji! Can I use your kitchen sink to wash the dye out of my hair?" The woman who had been cooking shouted after him.

"Knock yourself out!" came the response.

The woman who had just entered the apartment hurried through the kitchen as quickly as she could, limping as she went. "Shinji, do you have any hair dye on hand? Preferably blonde?"

There was a response but the water running in both the kitchen and down the hall blotted it out. The woman disappeared around the corner only to pop her head back through the doorway moments later.

"Sohn, your dad wants to know if you know where his contacts are."

"Yeah, they're in their container by the eye drops in the medicine cabinet."

"Contacts!" The brown haired woman pulled her head out from under the facet, her blue hair already starting to show through the brown. She pulled back her right eyelid and gently slipped out one of the contact lenses that made her eyes brown. She stood there and blinked at the kids for a moment, one red eye and one brown. With the blue hair mixed in with the soft brown and her mismatched eyes, she looked like some odd amalgamation of Rei Ayanami and Yui Ikari. She winked at the kids and removed the other contact lenses before sticking her head back under the facet.

It took almost half an hour but at the end all six of them had gathered around the table again. While the three adults were older, and the evidence of the gardens from which they sprang showed in their features, it was obvious that it was a grownup Rei and Shinji, along with an older Ritsuko sitting at the table. The children, while originally appearing to be their own parents, were obviously not now that the originals were there for comparison. Like their parents, it was written all over them who their parents were, but each had their own uniqueness to them. Sohn had natural red highlights in his hair, and sat up straighter in his chair, more confidence in his stature than Shinji had ever had at that age. Yuriko was missing her mother's tear like mark by her eye, and was dirtier than Ritsuko would have ever allowed herself to be at any age. Her hands also had several burn marks and other assorted scars on them. The difference between Nagisa and her mother was subtle at first, but obvious to anyone who had known Rei at that age. Nagisa was smiling. She was also frowning, chattering, scarfing food, joking with Sohn and occasionally bursting into odd songs that may or may not have anything to do with what's going on around her. Two generations that might have passed for the generation prior, sat around the table and dug into breakfast, as a family.

***

"Nagisa." Rei called her daughter's name, as the three friends were about to split up again. "Why don't you show me around? It's been a while since I've been here and… Well, you know."

"Sure _mom_." Nagisa put a slight emphasis on the word. She turned back to her friends. "Meet you guys in the usual place later?"

"Like we have anywhere else to go." Sohn waved as he disappeared out the door, Yuriko following him. The sound of the door sliding shut was accompanied with the sound of Shinji's bedroom door slamming shut.

"I think I'll go pick up some groceries." Ritsuko stood up. "Most of the stuff left is nonperishable, and I'm going to be staying a few days anyway. Catch you girls later."

Nagisa sat down at the kitchen table, Rei sliding into the chair across from her.

"How have you been?" Rei asked. Her voice had suddenly changed. Has Ritsuko ever heard Rei talk this way, she would have screamed. Rei's voice could drop the temperature in a room with a single word. This was the voice Rei had used all those years ago, when a glance from her was like a steel spike through the heart. 

"As well as can be expected." Nagisa answered. Her voice had also changed, becoming nearly identical to her mother's.

"Have you been practicing?"

"Yes."

"Everything?"

"… Everything."

"And the other, how is it going?"

"I'm not sure."

"How do the others respond to you, then?"

"I don't think they notice the aberrations. If they do, they chalk it up to me just being odd to begin with."

Rei sighed. "And your uncle, how has Shinji been?"

"Before or after?"

"After."

"Like this. He comes out to eat, he acts fine, but then he's gone again."

"Sohn?"

"Been doing better, lately. I guess nobody ever really handles their mothers death."

"I'm touched." Rei's smile was forced.

"You shouldn't be."

"Right." Rei nodded, the fake smile falling away. "The other?"

"Doubtful. But it's done, or will be soon."

"Good." Rei stood up.

"One question, _mother._"

"Yes?"

"Am I…" Nagisa hesitated. "Am I just a doll? Something that's been given a mask that makes me act human enough?"

Rei sat back down again and looked at her daughter. "I asked myself that question before, many times before, and more often than not I answered it with yes. I didn't even have the mask to hide behind. Shinji told me though, just before his wedding, the fact that I ask the question at all, that I'm worried about the answer being yes, makes it obvious what the answer is."

"I don't understand."

Rei stood up again, and leaned across the table to kiss her daughter forehead. "Neither did I. I'm going to go check on your uncle now. Keep your eyes on the children."

"I will. Goodbye, mother."

"Goodbye, daughter."

***

In a dark place, where there are no walls, no ceiling, and no floor, thirteen columns of moonlight appeared, a red number floating in the center on each one.

03: "Are things progressing?"

07: "They are."

04: "It is inconceivable that we have progressed this far."

02: "Correct. For we do not have the resources our predecessors in Seelie had."

03: "We do not have NERV to control."

04: "We do not have the Evas or the pilots either."

07: "An Eva has been acquired."

03: "How was this possible?"

07: "There were still avenues open to us."

03: "Then I will not inquire into the avenues. Has a pilot been acquired?"

08: "A Pilot has been acquired."

03: "What of the Magi?"

06: "They will not respond to us. They will not bend to our will."

04: "Who is it who brought them back?"

06: "The children of the children."

02: "Perhaps we can bend them to our will, and thus acquire the Magi?"

09: "Unlikely."

12: "Dr. Akagi might be a better choice."

10: "Equally unlikely."

13: "Dr. Akagi is not aware of us, and we are not Seelie. She has no reason to fear or distrust us."

10: "She will not help, regardless."

11: "Dr. Ibuki, then?"

09: "She has her attention… elsewhere."

03: "Oh? How has this come to pass?"

09: "The baby is due soon."

11: "Congratulations."

04: "Should we attempt to attain another computer? The Magi are outdated anyway."

08: "To attain one of the Babel computers would be difficult."

03: "The prototype then?"

06: "It would be noticed."

02: "We are running out of time. Perhaps the children would join us?"

10: "Unknown. They will be a factor, though."

04: "Perhaps we should let things fall as they may. The children might come to us of their own accord."

13: "Are we then in agreement?"

02-12: "Aye."

13: "Then the meeting is adjourned."

All but numbers 13 and 01 disappear.

13: "You did not speak."

01: "It was not for me to speak."

13: "Will the children help us?"

01: "They might not on principle alone."

13: "We are not Seelie, we do not share their goals."

01: "It might not matter."

13, sighs: "Events will begin to move very fast now. The children will notice."

01: "The world will notice."

13: "True. We have things to prepare for."

01: …

13: "We will speak again, afterwards."

01: "Yes, we will."

***

In the dark room there was only one source of illumination, a small screen by a European style bed. The screen was black with a pumpkin orange letters. The screen read, "Data deleted."

Shinji sighed, pulling his hand away from the plate allowing neural interface. He let himself fall back onto the bed.

"What am I going to do? Should I be a hero again?" Shinji rolled onto his side. "No, I've been that. The stage has been set and the hero's been chosen." He scrunched up, holding back the tears that threatened to fall. "The cost… the cost is so high. I've paid, but will they be able to? The tragedy of this is the ruination of the lives of those involved, the destruction of the children's minds." He pulled the sheet over his head, old memories of hiding under the covers doing little to ease his mind. "Listen to me, I sound so dramatic. None of that matters, everything has been set into motion. They really don't even need me anymore."

"I heard that, Shinji." The door to his bedroom slid open, a pair of red eyes peering at the lump on the bed. "We all still need you."

"No, you don't." Came his muffled reply. "Nobody needs me. Nobody ever _needed_ me. Not even… not even Him."

"If you don't stop acting like this, your son is going to go thru the same thing you did. He needs you and you need him. Don't become your father."

"Heh. If I did, I'd have cloned Asuka by now. There'd be a little white haired, red eyed girl running around."

Rei flinched. An uncharacteristic wave of emotion swept through her, pushing her to just leave him there, to let him curl up and die like he wanted to. Instead, she lifted up the sheet and slid in beside him. For a long while, the two just laid there, being close to one another. "_I_ still need you."

"… Rei." He reached out in the darkness only to find her hand ready for his. They interlaced their fingers and looked into one another's eyes. The soft morning light coming in shined through the thin sheet.

"He lost her, Shinji. He lost her and then lost everything in his grief, pushing it all aside. Don't be him, Shinji. Don't be your father."

"He cloned you just so he could see her again. He was willing to end the world just to be with her again." Shinji took a shaky breath and closed his eyes. "I hated him for it, for doing all of it, but now I'm faced with the same thing he was and…" He snapped his eyes open. His voice took on the same cold tone Gendo Ikari's had had years ago in life. "I'd do the same, if I could bring Asuka back."

Rei let go of his hand and looked into his eyes. They were cold and dark, completely closed off to her. "You have something he didn't, Shinji. Something that makes you stronger than him, that'll let you move on." She reached out and pulled him to her. "You have a sister."

He didn't return the hug. Not at first anyway. Then, his hands shaking, he slid his arms around her, squeezing their bodies together. They held each other like that for a long time, Rei finally breaking the silence.

"Shinji?"

"Yeah?"

"My arm's falling asleep."

Shinji let a smile spread across his lips.

"And you need to take a shower, you smell bad."

This elicited a snort of laughter from the former Eva pilot.

"And you need to go brush your teeth."

Rei could feel Shinji's sides shaking as he tried to hold in the laughter.

"'Cause your teeth are turning yellow!"

That final bit was all it took. Shinji erupted with laughter and pushed the sheet out of the way. Rei smiled, glad to see him laughing. It took a few minutes for Shinji to regain his composure.

"You don't have to act like this for me, Rei." Shinji cocked his head cocked to the side, his eyes filled with tears from laughing too hard. "You could just-"

"I like at least pretending to be human." Rei struck a pose that would have done the late Misato proud. "Besides, it feels good."

A cell phone on Shinji's nightstand began ringing. Shinji picked it up and simply looked at it for a moment. "You know, there was a time when I had a phone that never rang. Now the damn thing never seems to stop." He pushed the call button and held the phone up to his ear. "Ikari here. Yes… Yes… Mind if I bring someone along? … No, I don't care. … Of course they're family. … Uh huh. … Yeah, I owe you one. We'll be meeting at the site, correct? … Fine. … No, he's not coming. … I don't care if you do think he's cute, I don't want him involved in my work. … Fine, I'm coming now." Shinji ended the call and dropped the phone back into its spot. He started unbuttoning his shirt and kicked off his shoes. "I've got a call. Wanna come see what I do for a living?"

"Sure. Ritsuko can get in, right?"

"Yeah. Since Yuriko can get in, Ritsuko can get in. Same way you got in because of Nagisa's genetic structure." Shinji finished stripping and pulled the door to his closet open. Digging through his closet, he found his cleanest dirty shirt and pulled it over his shoulders, buttoning it one handed as he fumbled to find a pair of pants that weren't too wrinkled.

"Whatever happened to being obsessive compulsive about keeping things clean?"

"Having a child tends to break you of that. Besides, I've been… busy lately."

"Uh huh. Should I fix my hair, or will they mind?"

"I don't care how your hair looks and they probably won't even recognize you, Rei."

"Come on Shinji, how many red eyed, blue haired babes are there running around?"

"Just two that I'm aware of."

***

Nagisa wandered through the empty streets of the mostly abandoned Tokyo 3. For a while there had been gangs and such, trying to steal what they could, but the city itself seemed to have rejected even that life. Now only a few types of people remained, mostly personnel of companies who used "The Fortress of Mankind" as staging grounds for their more interesting and quiet projects. The organization once known as NERV now existed only in the history books, as did their weapons, the Evangelions. All remnants of that place had been whipped away, save the geofront that was still below the city, though it too had been abandoned and forgotten.

"What am I doing?" Nagisa asked the ghost of the city. "Why am I here, why am I doing this?"

A voice whispered in her ear, telling her the answer in it's own way. _Something's coming. She could feel it, something looming over the horizon, something huge. It was like the moon, something huge that hung over her head, waiting for her to look away so it could fall. Nagisa shuddered, feeling cold. She thought she heard something, an echo of steps from far away. Whatever it was, the sound of squealing tires blotted it out._

Tearing down the street in her red sports car, Nagisa could make out the figures of a glowering Yuriko and a screaming for mercy Sohn. Allowing her mask of humanity to fall into place, Nagisa stuck out her thumb and hitched up her skirt. Yuriko slammed on the brakes, skidding to a stop beside Nagisa.

"Hey little girl, ya want some candy?" Sohn leaned out of the window and pretended to look Nagisa up and down.

"I don't know. My mother always told me not to talk to strangers. And no one looks stranger than you."

"Cut it out you two! Come on Nagisa, something big is happening back at the place."

"What do you mean?" Nagisa tried to push away the premonition screaming at the back of her mind.

"It's the Magi." Sohn said as he slid into the back seat. "They're…doing stuff."

***

"Jet Alone, isn't it?" Rei leaned her head back to look up at the giant black and green robot.

"Yes, though this particular unit is actually referred to as JA-17." Shinji didn't look up at the large robot, he'd seen it enough times already. "JA-17 has both a remote and a human interface to control it. "

"So it can be piloted just like-"

"Yeah, just like them." Shinji interrupted. Glancing around, he leaned in close to Rei. "We try not to say that name around here. They don't want to admit that we're trying to replace them with the JA series."

"Which is why you've got a job here, correct?"

"Yeah. I guess I'm just destined to be 'Pilot Ikari' until the end of days."

"Hmmm…." Rei was careful not comment on his response. Shinji was doing a good job of hiding how he truly felt about his job, and Rei didn't want to hurt his feelings. "You said it could also be controlled via remote?"

"Yeah. Not enough experienced pilots stepped up, but there are currently a dozen models in use." Shinji shrugged, still not looking up at the robot. "So, rather than just have a smaller force we have computers control several of them."

"You mean like the Magi?"

"I guess. I said the same thing and they told me these computers are three to four times more powerful than the Magi."

"Really?" Rei asked and Shinji nodded. "Wow. Who built them?"

"Ritsuko, who else?"

Rei laughed. Shinji's trained ear could hear it was a fake laugh, having heard Rei's real laugh only a very few times before. _She tries so hard to act human, to be accepted. She shouldn't have to act at all. Rei, why can't you just be yourself? His assistant hurried over to them, interrupting Shinji's thoughts._

"Mr. Shinji, they're ready to launch when you are."

"Have they figured out what it is yet?"

"No sir."

"Figured out what 'what' is?" Rei interrupted.

"We're not sure, madam. Something big is stomping thru the countryside and it's about thirty stories tall." The assistant explained. "Sounds like the kind of job for our hero, here."

"Wow, you made hero status, eh?"

"More like 'legendary' status." Shinji grumbled. He took the offered suit from his assistant and started pulling it on over his clothes, only removing his shoes first. "We've only actually gotten to use these things in battle twice since they hired me, and both times the enemy backed down before we could engage."

"But they might stick around this time, sir." The assistants looked like he was hoping for this.

"Wanting to see your 'hero' in action, are you?" Rei inquired.

"Oh yes! I mean, from when I first was accepted as his assistant I've been waiting to-"

"I'm ready." Shinji interrupted. "I'm taking the lift up. Rei, I think they'd let you take one of these out if you'd like to join me."

"Oh I don't think so. I think I'll just watch from the safety of the control room. My car stomping days are over!"

"Um, huh?" Shinji's assistant said as intelligently as he ever said anything.

"I'm Shinji's- sister." The assistant completely missed the hesitation in Rei's voice. "And a former Eva pilot to boot. I actually have more experience at the job than Shinji does."

"Yeah, the only Eva pilot ever to give her life in the line of duty and then went on to pilot some more." Shinji said under his breath, his assistant missing that as well. He stood and faced the blue haired woman. "Goodbye Rei."

"A wise man told me never to say goodbye."

"Then I'll see you when this is over."

"When is it ever over?"

Shinji laughed and gave Rei a hug. "Goodbye, Rei."

***

"I don't understand! How could it possibly do this?" Sohn stared up at the huge shape. It was yellow with orange markings. It stood taller than anything he'd ever seen, taller even than his fathers JA-17. There seemed to be braces of some sort, perhaps locks, holding its arms and shoulder to the wall. He'd passed through the room itself hundreds of times, remembering Yuriko had once mentioned it as "The Cage" and now he could see why the room had that name. It held the behemoth to it, as if this lightning colored monster was some lunatic chained to a wall in an asylum. Its three orange eyes stared into the empty space before it. "This… what is this?"

"Evangelion Unit 14." Yuriko answered.

"What? How do you know?" Sohn turned towards his dark haired friend. She had her laptop open and was staring at the screen. "How did it get here?"

"The Magi. They did this."

"But how?"

"I don't know."

"Maybe…" Nagisa spoke up for the first time since first see entering the room. "Maybe one of us should try and pilot it?"

***

"Approaching target." Shinji kept his voice professional and cold.

"Wow, we haven't gotten this close before." One of the other pilots said.

"Cut the chatter, JA-5. They might be monitoring." Shinji berated him.

"Do you have visual contact yet?" Renglo, Shinji's boss, asked, his face appearing one of the lower screens inside Shinji's cockpit.

"Negative." Shinji answered. "Correction, visual contact eminent." Shinji crested the hill he was stomping up and halted in his steps.

"My God…" The other Jet Alone pilot voice was filled with awe.

"It's… It's an…" The first pilot stuttered, his mind trying to grasp what he was seeing.

Inside the control room, Rei felt like screaming. "It's an Eva."

***

Nagisa's voice: "It's a showdown between Shinji and the ghost of his past. Rei feels helpless as she watches Shinji fight. But then, a new threat arrives to complicate matters. How will Shinji handle the sudden shock of the reappearance of the Evangelions? Don't worry, the kids play a role too! And of course, MORE FAN SERVICE! YEAH! Maybe I can get Yuriko to do a striptease or something... Hey! She's sixteen! It's legal!"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

**OMAKE!**

The kids come into the kitchen, looking at the woman cooking breakfast. Suddenly, a woman stumbles in through the same door the kids had come thru.

"Kit?"

The woman cooking turned around. "Ai?"

A sound at the other doorway and both women turned towards it, finding an unshaven man in glasses. "Ryo?"

"Eh?" Ryo cocked an eyebrow. "How did we get in this story? DAMNIT! Synaid's gone to sleep again!"

The three children were stuck by the oddity of the moment.

"What do you mean?" Nagisa tried to push away the premonition screaming at the back of her mind.

"It's the Magi." Sohn said as he slid into the back seat. "They're…doing stuff."

"Like what?" Nagisa's fears seemed to be coming true...

"THEY'RE PLAYING A QUAKE TOURNAMENT!!!!"

"It's a... It's a... IT'S A GUNDAM! AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!!" Cannon fodder number one tried to run as the Wing Zero brought his buster rifle to bare.

"Omea o korosu!"

Shinji whipped out a plasma sword. "Come and get me, you MONSTERS!"


	2. 2

**Other Souls 2**

Episode 2

By synaid@yahoo.com

V 1.3

**Author's Notes:** For those of you wondering, Sohn is German for son. Don't ask me why I named him that. I've forgotten where I got Yuriko's name and a real fan knows where Nagisa's name came from. Props to acountrygirl4ever (search for her in the author section) for the name Collena, but I decided to go with the name Odiu. I'll tell you what Odiu means at a later date.

()()()

Shinji wanted to scream. With all his heart he wanted to scream. The image of his nightmares now stood before him. The color and design were different from any of the others, different from anything he'd ever seen, but he knew an Eva when he saw one.

This one was predominantly gunmetal gray, with a trim of burnt red, specifically around the neck and in other joints. The Eva's eyes glowed red. It's shoulders were different too, it's armor looking more like a suit of armor than the harnesses the old Eva's had been equipped with. There was no power cord to it, so Shinji knew that it had to be equipped with a Super Solenoid engine, the human equivalent to the S2 organ Shinji's own Eva had consumed from the body of an Angel more than twenty years prior. In it's left hand it held a battle-axe, it's blade larger than most cars. Unlike the prior engagements, the Eva had not run before the JA team could get a look at it. The Eva simply stood there, staring directly at JA-17 and right at Shinji. Forcing his fear down and away, Shinji opened a communication channel to the nightmare made flesh.

"This is the leader of Delta Force and pilot of Jet Alone unit Seventeen. Identify yourself and state your purpose."

Rei listened to Shinji from the control room; six of the worlds most powerful super computers humming around her. Unlike the others around her, she could sense the fear in her brother's voice. She doubted that anyone other than someone who had known him as long as she did, or had been as close to him as she had, could hear the slight catch in his voice and the tremor towards the end. Still, given what he was facing, and knowing the coward he had once been, Rei knew what it took for Shinji to sound as calm and commanding as he did. She was proud to be considered his sister.

"I…" The Eva pilot hesitated. "I am the pilot of Eva." While the voice was clearly being scrambled to make identification of the pilot impossible, it was obviously a female voice. "And my purpose… you will discover my purpose soon enough." She calmly held out one hand, palm down, and pointed at one of the Jet Alone units. Shinji remembered a moment too late that it was one of the piloted units. The Eva's gauntlet popped open, steel spikes the size of phone polls firing out of it. The spikes ripped through the piloted JA, shredding thru the cockpit and mutilating the pilot. The JA fell to the ground, it's entire upper torso exploding a moment later. Even had the pilot lived through the spikes, there's no way they could have survived that.

"Pilot's life signs gone. Babel Cluster is not receiving a single form JA-07."

"JA-04 is down! So is unit 08!"

Renglo, the man technically in charge of the operation and Shinji's direct boss, was in shock. He simply stared at the scene shown from a hundred different angles. Each way he looked was one of the Jet Alone units being mowed down. _They're dropping like flies._ He thought to himself.

"Almost all of them are offline."

"Who's left?" Rei stepped forward, brushing the stunned commander aside and taking command.

"JA 13 and JA 17. One of the Babel controlled and Pilot Ikari."

"Have the computer controlled one step in front of Shinji, and order it to defend Shinji but not attack the Eva. Order Shinji to draw his proton rifle."

"And then?" The computer tech looked over his shoulder at the blue haired woman.

"Shinji should know what to do then. It's an old game of ours."

***

"I… I think I'm gonna be sick." Sohn did his best to keep his lunch down.

"Shut up, Sohn." Nagisa leaned over his shoulder, looking at the readouts displayed. "Wow! So many pretty colored words!"

"The Magi aren't telling me anything." Yuriko's face popped up in a window. "They won't tell me how this got here or who built it or anything! It's got a Super Solenoid engine for Christ sakes!"

"Who cares where it came from? It's ours now!"

"Nagisa, this is _not_ a toy! It's a weapon of mass destruction and death." Yuriko tried to patiently explain the concept to her impulsive friend.

"Really? COOL!"

"Sohn, get her out of that cockpit _NOW!_"

"Yes, Aunty Yuriko. Ejecting entry plug." The long white tube slid out of the back of the Eva and popped its hatch. Nagisa was the first to get out, Sohn offering her a hand to steady herself by as she stepped down.

"Come on, Baka, I'm not going to wait forever down here! I need to take a shower; this orange stuff smells like blood! And I want some toast!" Nagisa stared up at the open house, surprised when it snapped shut. She had time to let out a startled "HEY!" before the entry plug smoothly slid back into the Eva. "Yuriko, what's going on?"

"I don't know!" Yuriko's voice boomed over the speakers in the cage. "The Magi have locked me out of everything! It's like they're-" The Eva began to move, or rather it's casing moved, taking it with them. It slid over and into the wall on the far side of the room. Hatch after hatch opened above it, all the way to the surface. "They're going to launch! The Magi are going to-"

"LAUNCH EVA!!!" Nagisa struck a pose and pointed at the Eva. She couldn't explain why she did it, or even where she'd seen the pose before. It just seemed appropriate to her. But then, running around the block in a snowstorm in just her panties screaming "I'm on a mission!" was also appropriate to her.

There was a crackle of energy as the magnetic locks were shut off and the Eva was shot up thru the tubes.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!"

"Sohn, calm down!"

"YOU calm down, Yuriko! LET ME OUT!"

"I can't! The Magi won't let me mess with anything!"

"Can't you, like, unplug them or something?!?"

"These are some of the most sophisticated super computers of the last generation! At one time they ran all of Tokyo-3! YOU DON'T JUST UNPLUG THEM!"

"I don't know what you're yelling about…" Sohn allowed his voice to go calm for a moment. "WHEN IT'S ME WHO'S TRAPPED IN THIS PSYCHOTIC KILLING MACHINE!!!!!"

"Oh liven up, Sohn." Nagisa's face popped up beside Yuriko's. "You always were bragging about how your parents piloted Eva, now you get to prove how well you'd have done in their place."

"OH SHUT UP! Why is this taking so long anyway?"

"Well, to begin with you're being sent to the outskirts of the city. On top of that, there wasn't a clear path to the surface, so you're being diverted all over the place."

"Why am I being sent there?!?"

"Sohn, if I knew I'd already be bringing you back, wouldn't I?"

"No reason to get smart, Yuriko." Nagisa grinned. "If you can't do it, you can't do it. I guess Wonder Boy here will just have to deal with it himself."

"GUYS!"

"Approaching surface." Yuriko's window popped up in front of Nagisa's. "Because of the Super Solenoid engine you'll have unlimited power, but don't burn up too much power at one time, as the S2 engine just recharges your battery, not directly powers the Eva. Good luck, Sohn." And both windows winked out, leaving Sohn alone.

"How did she know all that about the Eva?" Sohn asked the silent cockpit. With a hiss, the Eva reached the surface. The safety locks clicked off, the Eva hunching forward without the support. "Ok. Ok. Mom told me about this. I just grip the handles and imagine what I want to happen." Sohn slid his hands around the smooth white handles, his fingers wrapping around them, instinctually feeling for the trigger. "LET ME OUT! LET ME OUT! LEMME OUT!" He tried as hard as he could to imagine the back of the Eva popping open and the entry plug ejecting. Of course, nothing happened. "Well, it was worth a try. Ok now, walking. I've got to get this thing out of here before someone notices it." He calmed himself as much as he could, as much as anyone could under the circumstances, and focused on lifting one of the giant feet.

The first step was a success, however the second one was interrupted when he caught the giant mecha's foot on an abandoned car. The fall was enough to knock Sohn out. He was only unconscious for a moment, the sound of an explosion pulling him out of the darkness. Sohn tried to look up, struggling to get the Eva to right itself. A giant gray hand grabbed the Eva's face and lifted it up to a standing position. Sohn knew what it was in front of him now, how could he not? He was in something very similar.

The gray Eva seemed to smile, though Sohn knew it was just the way the armor around the mouth was. The gray Eva drew back an arm and then smashed it's fist into Eva 14's face. Unit 14 reeled back, crashing into the building behind it. Sohn absently noted that the buildings hadn't been lowered. Sohn covered his face with his hands, blood pouring from his nose. It felt like someone had hit _him_ instead of the Unit 14.

A screen popped up, though it was nothing more than static. "You were not expected. You must be eliminated. The prophecy only allows for one." A mangled but female voice cut threw the static filtering through the open channel.

"No, wait! I- I just want to go home! I don't want to-"

"Only one can be allowed!" The other Eva slammed its fist into Unit 14's stomach area. Sohn gasped and hunched forward in the cockpit, the imagined air knocked out of his lungs. Tears welled up in his eyes from the pain. He looked up to see the other Eva reach up with its left hand and pull a progressive knife from it's shoulder, the glowing blade extending slowly, as if to emphasize to Sohn what was about to happen.

"No." He breathed out as the other Eva drew its left hand back to make its thrust.

***

Sohn stared at the ceiling above him. He didn't remember waking up, he didn't remember going to sleep. He knew he'd been awake for some time, but not aware of the world around him. He turned his head slightly, trying to take in the room around him. A curtain divided the room. The sounds of machines from the other side of the curtain told him there was another bed, like his, with someone in it. Around his bed there were no machines, only chairs. Nagisa had curled up in one chair, her legs dangling over one arm with her head tilted backwards over the other. Another chair had flowers in it, one from Aunt Rei and the other from Ritsuko. The last chair was partially occupied by Yuriko. The majority of her body was in bed with Sohn, his left hand caught between both of hers. Both her and Nagisa were asleep and both looked like they'd been thru hell already. Sohn squeezed Yuriko's hand, she reflexively squeezing it back in her sleep.

"Yuriko…"

"Mmmhmmm?"

"Yuriko wake up."

"Mmmm…" Her brow creased.

"Yuriko, I'm going to need my hand back."

Yuriko's eyes flew open as her sleepy mind grasped what Sohn was saying, or at least that he was saying anything at all. "SOHN!" she shouted, wrapping her arms around him. "You're alive!"

"Well of course he's alive! Wonder Boy here can live thru anything!" Nagisa had come awake much quicker than Yuriko had, perhaps not really having been asleep to begin with. "He just stepped out for a minute, nothing serious."

"Yeah, any calls while I was out?"

"Well, the UN showed up of course." Nagisa answered. "Wanted to know how four kids built themselves a private army."

"But we didn't build the Eva, the Magi or somebody did!" Sohn looked to Yuriko who was still hugging him. "Umm… Yuriko?"

"Yeah?"

"Oxygen is becoming an issue."

"Huh? Oh!" Yuriko jerked her hands away, blushing.

Nagisa ignored the whole thing and started munching on one of the flower stems.

"The… UN confiscated everything that was there and is searching our apartments. I think the only reason the four of us aren't in jail right now is because of your father and Ms. Ayanami. I don't know what they said to make the UN stop like that, but it must have been good."

"Yeah, dad always was good at talking fast." Sohn stared at the curtain separating the room. "Wait a minute, you said four of us."

"Yeah!" Nagisa said around the flower stem. "The other Eva pilot was a teenager too. They think the dummy plug system took control of the Eva."

"Why would it take over?"

"Seems it was infected by an angel, from the way things… went." Yuriko cast her eyes down, the slight blush coming back. "The doctors said it was amazing the two of you survived it."

"Some of us are still trying to die, thank you."

The girl's voice startled the friends. The rasping that followed the girl's outburst showed how much it cost her to say just that. There was a sudden beeping and two nurses rushed in. After stepping behind the curtain, one of them stepped back and frowned at the kids.

"I'm sorry, but the two of you will have to leave. You can talk to your friend when he's released tomorrow, but right now the other patient needs quiet."

"Hey Sohn almost bought it today and he-"

Nagisa grabbed Yuriko by the shoulder and gave her an uncharacteristically serious look. "We understand. We'll be going now." Before Yuriko could protest, Nagisa yanked her out of the room and into the hallway.

"What was that about?" Yuriko demanded.

"Did you see the look on his face when the other pilot spoke?"

"No."

"That's right, you didn't. And neither did I, even though we were both looking right at him. He didn't _have_ a look on his face. That's not the response Sohn should have given when he finds out the person he almost killed is still alive and is lying next to him." Nagisa turned away and started walking towards the elevators. "Come on, I'm hungry. I feel the need for TOAST!"

***

Sohn waited until the nurses were gone before speaking again.

"Who… Who are you?"

"I am nothing." A rasping breath, and then, "and you're the light."

"What?" Sohn didn't understand. Maybe the other patient had something done to her brain.

"The light destroys the nothing."

Neither of them spoke for the rest of the time. Sohn just stared up at an empty white ceiling and the sound of the girl's breathing filled the room. Sohn didn't remember falling asleep, and he didn't remember waking up, but when Rei walked in a few moments later, more than twelve hours had gone by.

"How's my favorite nephew?"

"I feel like I've been hit by a car."

"I can sympathize. Can't tell you how many times I woke up in a hospital bed." Rei smiled reassuringly. "So tell me, how much do you remember?"

"I remember the other Eva hitting me, and then… and then pulling out some kind of vibrating knife… Then I passed out or something. Guess I lost the fight, huh?"

The girl in the other bed laughed. It sounded something like a frog screaming as it was having nails pounded into it. Rei's smile didn't falter or change in the slightest, though.

"That's all you remember, huh?" Rei asked

"Well, yeah. Isn't that all that happened?"

Again the girl in the other bed laughed.

"What is it with her anyway?"

Rei brushed the comment aside and gathered up his flowers. "Come on Sohn, get dressed. You've been released from the hospital. I'm going to take you to my in town apartment and you'll be staying with Nagisa and me for a few days."

Sohn pushed himself into a sitting position. "With you? What about dad? Isn't he going to-"

"Your father is pretty busy right now." There wasn't even a hint of bitterness in her body or her voice. "Don't worry, I can cook just as well as he can. Hope you like vegetarian meals for a while though. Here are your clothes, pull them on and we can leave."

"But I-"

"Come on, Shinji, we've got to keep hopping. A body in motion is a healthy body. Besides, you need a bath."

_"Did she just call me Shinji?"_

It only took a few minutes to get dressed. Moving around, he realized he wasn't really hurt, just cramped. His mind kept telling him things, like his leg was broke and his arm had been pulled from its socket, but he felt no pain upon moving either of them and walked without difficulty. Just before stepping out, Sohn intended to pull back the curtain and see his "roommate" for the first and last time.

"Sohn."

"Yes?"

"No."

Sohn let his hand fall away from the curtain and followed Rei out, looking over his shoulder at the curtain.

***

Six monoliths appeared, the numbers nine through thirteen and number one inscribed on each.

09: "Things did _not_ go as planned."

12: "There were some unanticipated factors."

11: "The other Eva was not expected."

13: "How is it that there are two Evas?"

10: "Unsure."

09: "It seems there are some things that are beyond our control."

10: "And beyond our knowledge."

12: "No. We simply miscalculated. We had forgotten the resourcefulness of the children."

13: "It was… luck, that they stepped forward when they did."

09: "Yes, luck. Had things gone as planned, the angel might have broken through."

10: "Why are the others not present for this?"

01: "I do not trust them."

10: "I see…"

12: "This changes things. The timetable might be altered by-"

13, interrupting: "This has changed nothing and everything."

11: "What do you mean?"

13: "What once was now is again. The angel proved that. While this is different from what we expected, it does not change what will be done.

09: "How can you say that? The return of the Evas heralds a new era!"

13: "No, it simply returns us to a previous one."

10: "Does it really? Once, the return of the angels brought about the Evas. Now it seems the return of the Evas has brought about the angels."

11: "Are you saying we are not to trust the angels?"

13: "The angels are God's puppets. They will act as such. It is the Evas that can no longer be controlled. They are the unstable factor."

12: "Unstable variable."

13: …

12: "Sorry."

10: "What will be done?"

11: "Nothing can be done. The UN has already claimed jurisdiction over both Evas."

09: "That was nice of them. Keeps the countries from squabbling over them. The Americans are upset."

11: "They would be."

12: "The unit _was_ built by them."

13: "The UN is not making the same mistakes it made last time. They have their own people controlling what was once NERV."

01: "They have done something else."

13: "What?"

01: "Ikari is in control of the Evas, and his son will pilot again."

***

She sat alone in the bed. The light had left her, not that he'd said much anyway. She hated him. She hated the light. Being alone was not fun either, but the light hurt. The light burned her, seared her skin, and being alone was only a dull throb from time to time. Yes, she liked being alone. Just her and her body… Her mind froze. She lifted her left arm and stared at the end of it, as she'd done every hour since awakening. Where once there had been a beautiful delicate hand, was now just a gauze wrapped stump. The doctors had already explained that two of the fingers and most of her thumb had been saved, though they were horribly disfigured, and much shorter than they should have been. Nearly every bone in her left hand had been removed, making it look like a ball with three spikes stuck in it attached to her wrist instead of a hand. She'd been able to see it briefly as the nurses had changed the gauze, and had started laughing when she did see it. She still wasn't clear on why she had laughed, though she'd just gotten done screaming so that might have had something to do with it. They'd allowed her to see her face for the first time, giving her a hand mirror.

The girl turned her head to see the mirror, still setting on the stand by her bed. With a trembling hand, she grabbed it and looked into it again. The right side of her face belonged to the same image she greeted every morning in the mirror. It was beautiful, the spitting image of her mother's face. Dark black hair, the color of the night sky, tumbling down her shoulder and perfectly framing her face. Hey eye was like poured silver, shimmering in the light. The left side of her face, however… She touched the stump of her hand against the pad over her left eye. She knew, from the pain and what had been told to her, that she would never see through that eye again. There were stitches all over that side of her face, particularly around her eye. With a shaking hand she put the mirror back where it had originally been. She allowed her head to fall back on the pillows, staring up at the same empty ceiling Sohn had stared at for the last few hours.

She could hear a storm starting outside; the wind was already shaking the windows. She closed her eye and listened to the wind tap at the glass, as if asking to be let in. She opened her eye and looked down at her body. Sheets covered her, but the shape made by them told her enough. Most of her left breast was gone and several of her ribs had been shattered. Her left leg was bent in an odd way, the doctor's had told her she'd be crippled the rest of her life. In junior high she'd been the track star, competing in almost every event. But now, she'd be lucky if she could ever walk again.

But none of that mattered to her right now. She knew it'd be all that was on her mind later, but right now it wasn't important. It was the burning between her legs and in her stomach that hurt the most.

_"I'm sorry, but we had to remove your reproductive organs."_ One of the doctors had said. He hadn't even looked up at her as he continued to coldly read off the clipboard in front of him. _"Look on the bright side, you'll never have to have a period again."_

_"Or go thru the **joy** of child birth."_ Another doctor rolled her eyes.

_"I… I can't have children?"_

_"My dear, you can't even have sexual intercourse, not that you would be able to enjoy it even if you could."_

"I can't have children." It'd become a mantra of sorts. She repeated it over and over in her head, as if trying to convince herself it was true. "I can't have children. I can't have children." She barely said it above a whisper, but it screamed inside her mind. "I'm… I'm not a real woman. I'm not a whole woman." Sucking in a deep breath of air, she did the only thing that seemed right to her. She screamed.

***

Sohn looked around the neighborhood. It was in the part of town still being rebuilt, the banging of a building under construction across the street blotted out almost all other noise, Rei and Shinji having to shout at one another to be heard.

"This is going to be home. For a while anyway." Rei slid a key into the outdated lock, fumbling a bit with the doorknob.

"Why can't I stay with dad?"

"Why don't you take a bath first? Everyone feels better after a bath." Rei hit the door with her shoulder, getting it to pop loose from the frame and finally open. "It's the humidity, it makes the wood get tight." She pushed aside a stack of unopened boxes with one foot, her hands full with bags from the convenience store they had stopped at along the way. "I've got a show tonight so I'm going to be using the kitchen sink to die my hair, so don't get worried if the hot water occasionally cuts out. The bath is down the hall, on the right."

"Aunt Rei, I don't want to impose." Sohn looked up to his aunt, prepared to try again to go home.

"You're not imposing, you're family." She smiled at him and then stepped into the kitchen. A dishtowel came flying through the doorway a moment later, a dried red substance on parts of it. "Sorry but I haven't bought any bath towels yet. Use that to dry off, ok?"

"I…" Sohn bent over and picked up the dishtowel. With a sigh he went in search of the bath.

***

Ritsuko Akagi stood in the once command center of NERV, staring down at the three supercomputers that made up the system known as the Magi. She'd spent years of her life working on those three computers, coming up with the strategies that would later save the world over and over again. It's possible that the Magi could even have saved the world the final time, had it not been for her own selfishness and wounded pride. But still, if the Magi had done as asked at the final moments, the world might have been saved. But it didn't matter anyway. Apparently the world wasn't going to be saved simply by killing those who threatened it. Then again, maybe Ritsuko's mother was just stubborn. Ritsuko sighed and shook her head, not wanting to look at the resurrected reminder of her mother.

"Your daughter is quite amazing." Shinji said, stepping up beside her. "I'm not entirely sure even you could have resurrected the Magi after what they'd been through."

"All I did was take an axe to them. It was to work out some aggression and-"

"I know, Ritsuko."

"Yes, of course." She huffed a bit and turned away from Shinji.

"You know, maybe we should keep her around. The UN technicians are already encountering some… odd rewiring in the Casper. They haven't even started on Balthasar or Melchior."

"I'm not going to drag her into this like we dragged you and the other children. What we did was evil and-"

"She's facing criminal charges for defacing and hacking into a world government's multi-million dollar computer."

Ritsuko turned around and glared at Shinji. "Did you do this?"

"_I_ didn't need to do anything. I just allowed the kids to be themselves."

"And in doing so have forced them to become Eva pilots."

"Rei and I tried the new Evas. The gray one wouldn't allow either of us to synch with it and the yellow one, Eva Unit 14, ejected Rei almost immediately. It seems I'm enough like Sohn for it to allow me in. In the future I might even be able to move it, but as it stands now the children are the only viable pilots. Besides, they would be in jail by now if it weren't for there-"

"You're just like your father." Ritsuko expected Shinji to lose it right there. She'd seen him angry enough to hit another person only a few times and it was usually at the mention of his father. Instead Shinji just laughed. "What's so funny?"

"Apparently I was enough like him for you to-" Shinji staggered back, the red mark from Ritsuko's hand already showing up on his face.

"I accept the offer, and so will Yuriko. But she's going to be my assistant and nothing else." Ritsuko turned and walked away, stopping at the doorway and turning towards Shinji. "Just so you know, I did it because you _weren't_ like your father, because you had a heart."

***

Sohn had found the bathroom. The tile floor had a thick layer of mildew; cockroaches scurried across it so as not to get stepped on. There was a hole the size of a softball in one wall and the shower curtain was being used to cover it up.

Sohn sighed, "How to take a shower without touching anything. The trials and tribulations of living with your aunt." Sohn tugged off his clothes and started the water. Sliding into the tub, he stared up at the water damaged ceiling above him. "She's a nice person, I guess. I mean, this is only the second time I've met her and she is dad's only sister. I don't even know what she does for a living. She said she has a show tonight…"

***

Rei held the hand mirror up, looking at her new reflection. "Dark green hair with purple bangs. Guess I better go with the blue contacts. Hmm… what color for the eyebrows? Matching green, or purple?" She glanced between the two dye brushes, finally deciding to just leave her eyebrows their natural ice blue. Laying the mirror down, she started to unbutton her shirt and glanced around for the raver outfit she had set out. _I am unsure of how to deal with Sohn. He reminds me of Shinji, when he was this age. He got that same look in his eyes that Shinji used to get when we talked about Evas. Kind of a combination of horror and awe…_

_"Don't you have faith in your father's work?"_

_"Of course not! How could I after what he's done?"_

The sound of the slap she'd given Shinji that day still echoed in her mind. She'd hated him for a moment. Less than a day went by after that, and she'd found herself waiting nervously by the coffin-like medical bed, praying that he wouldn't die. Then, after the battle with Ramiel the fifth angel, she'd rewarded him with a smile. It had been the first time she smiled at anyone except Shinji's father. Her feelings for him had continued to grow, especially when the second child, Asuka, arrived. It wasn't until the end though, when she fought Armisael the sixteenth angel, did her feelings truly come to the surface. Afterwards she couldn't remember any of it, her memories only coming back in broken pieces over the following years, but she knew now what the experience had cost her. Shinji had shown up as Armisael merged with her Eva and forced it's way into her mind. When it reached out to merge with Shinji as well, she made the only choice she could, both as a pilot and as someone who loved Shinji. Shinji's pleadings as she drew Armisael back to herself, and the final moment when she self-destructed her Eva, saving Shinji by killing the angel and herself.

Rei looked around her kitchen, thinking about how unlike Shinji's kitchen it was. While Shinji's kitchen had always been warm, well stocked and almost always had something on the burner; Rei's kitchen only _looked_ like someone used it. It showed ever sign that it was used, but had no actual evidence of use. It's like an empty train car rolling down the tracks, well used but nobody was riding. As Nagisa had put it once, "Signs of life but no life itself." Rei had done as best as she could to make her apartment look normal, but had never really succeeded. _I guess the only real way to have something looked lived in is to actually live there…_

The sound of toast popping up brought her back to reality. Snagging a slice, she bit into it and glanced at the clock. "Oh crap! I'm going to be late!" Rei yanked on a jacket and ran towards the door. "I hope Sohn can take care of himself tonight."

***

"Rei? Are you home?" Nagisa stuck her head through the door. She'd rarely been in her _mother's_ apartment since the initial move to Tokyo-3, usually staying over at Uncle Shinji's apartment. Rei had moved away from Tokyo-3 several times, moving back only for a little while before leaving again. As usual, even with Rei living in town, nobody was home. Nagisa wandered into the kitchen, pulling a cup of instant noodles from the cupboard. She thought she heard something in the bathroom, which was odd as the apartment was supposed to be empty. Nagisa came to the logical conclusion that if this was Rei's apartment, and there was a sound like someone was in Rei's apartment, than it was probably Rei. Nagisa stepped into the hallway and walked down the hall. She intended to inquire why she now had a UN security pass, which clearly stated that she was an "Evangelion Pilot" on it. Nagisa had no memory of signing up for the UN or the job of an Eva pilot, and was understandably confused as to why she now worked for the UN and was an Eva pilot.

Reaching the bathroom door, she slid it open and opened her mouth to begin a verbal intercourse with Rei. However, it was not Rei that was in the bathtub as Nagisa had originally theorized. A very naked and now very red Sohn instead occupied it. Realizing that perhaps it was time to switch mental gears, Nagisa did just that.

"YOU PERVERT! What are you doing in my mother's bathtub?!?"

"Well- I- uh-" Sohn tried to stand up. Nagisa gave an "EEEEKKKK!!!!" and slammed the door shut. Sohn was left alone in the bathroom; wet, cold and confused.

***

Rei tried to push everything out of her mind and just focus on the song. She'd missed the beat several times already, and her guitar playing was erratic at best. Rei called upon the focus that being an Eva pilot had taught her, focusing her entire conscious on the song. It was her whole world. Just her, the band, the stage and the song.

I've got curved lines from my toe to my head,  
I know it's my body you want to take to bed,  
I know I'm your every dream.

But can you see my tears?  
Would you listen to my fears?  
Could you stand to hear me scream?

The roaring in my mind,  
Tells me you're unkind.  
What should I do with someone so mean?

I don't care who you are,  
I don't care about the car,  
I want to see what can't be seen!

The song had the audience going. The ravers' heads bobbed up and down and banged together to the repetitive music. Most of them couldn't hear the lyrics. Those who could hear them wouldn't understand them, either from a lack of intelligence or from the drugs. The people here were here to escape from their depressing lives, not be reminded of them by some thirty-five year old woman trying to look twenty.

_What am I doing here?_ Rei shook her head, stumbling through the guitar solo. **_Why_** do I do this? I should be home, with them. That is my purpose. Rei continued on to the next song.

***

"What are _you_ doing in _my_ bathtub?"

"You mother told me to take a bath and-"

"SHE'S NOT MY-" Nagisa choked it back, lying down across the length of the couch. "Oh never mind. Have you heard the news?"

"News?" Sohn folded his legs underneath him and sat on the floor, working a towel over his still wet hair. Nagisa had thrown it at him when he stepped out with only the dishcloth covering him.

"Yeah, seems you made hero status through being an idiot."

"Hey, you were the one that said we should get in the stupid thing! It wasn't my fault that-"

"And they noticed and punished me for it. I'm an Eva pilot now."

"What?" Sohn caught the ID card Nagisa tossed to him. It displayed Nagisa, her tongue sticking out and one of her eyes rolling the other way from its partner. Under her name was her classification, _Evangelion Pilot_. "Wow, that's pretty cool, Nagisa."

"Ya think so? Here's your ID."

"My ID?" Sohn missed the grab on this one. He leaned over and picked it up, an odd feeling coming over him. "Classification: Evangelion Pilot. I'm a pilot?"

"Yeah. Thank your dad for me. I've never been allowed to pilot a weapon of mass destruction before." Nagisa swung her legs around and stood up. "I'm going to bed. Mom won't be back until late, probably. You should catch some Z's too, we've got our first synch test tomorrow." With that, Nagisa disappeared out of the room and down the hall.

"Nagisa." Sohn called out, the sound of her door slamming shut his only answer.

An hour later found him staring at a ceiling. The ceiling was held up by the three walls and a doorframe to what Sohn thought of as a very large walk in closet, because there was no way he was going to consider it to be a bedroom. While one of his two best friends might just tease him about his whining, the room really was small. The futon he had attempted to unroll touched all three walls. There weren't any covers on the futon, nor did Sohn want any from what he had seen of the few sheets he'd seen.

Sohn didn't know what to think of his current situation. His father had gone from never going outside of the bedroom, except to eat, to working non-stop in less than a day. His one and _only_ aunt, who he'd only met once before, had now taken him to raise. The only person he had ever felt close too, besides his mother, was Nagisa, and she seemed to have altered drastically since finding out that he was going to be staying at her mother's apartment. The only two remaining people in his life were Yuriko and her mother, Ritsuko. He'd gotten a hold of Yuriko, her cell phone having been busy for the better of an hour. That conversation had not gone well.

_"Who is this?"_

_"Yuriko?" Sohn asked, surprised at how tired her voice sounded._

_"No, I'm Yuriko. Who is this?"_

_"It's me, Sohn."_

_Yuriko sighed. "What do you need, Sohn. I'm **really** busy."_

_"Well, I- um…"_

_"Sohn…"_

_"Everyone is acting weird around me, and I don't understand why. I know that getting into the Eva was wrong but-"_

_"But we're not in trouble for that." Yuriko finished up. "Sohn, how much do you remember about the battle?"_

_"I remember passing out just before I lost…"_

_"Sohn?"_

_"Yeah?"_

_"You didn't pass out. And you didn't lose either." For a moment there was dead silence on the line. "Listen, I've got to go. You're staying at Ms. Ayanami's, right?"_

_"Yeah?"_

_"Good. Stay there for a few days. Mom is going to send someone to pick you up on Tuesday. Don't lose your card. Bye!"_

_"Wait, Yuriko, what do you mean I didn't-"_

**_Click._**__

_"Lose…" Sohn finished._

Sohn held up his ID card, as if trying to blot out the ceiling with it. "Evangelion pilot. Just like I always dreamed…" He let go of the card and let if flutter downwards toward him, landing on his chest. Not having the card to separate himself from the ceiling, he closed his eyes. The construction work outside reminded him of footsteps. Slow and methodical, like some modern day colossus.

_Someone was yelling._

***

"Sohn. Sohn get out of there now!" Yuriko was screaming in his ear. He could feel his eyes getting so wide it hurt. The vibrating knife sliced through the air, falling like a lightning bolt towards Sohn.

"Don't touch me." The words didn't sound like his. It didn't sound like his voice. The armor-covered hand, that could crush a car like a beer can, which reached out and caught the descending hand, surely wasn't his. If anything, the voice along with the hand was… feminine. First the hand that wasn't his just held the other hand, keeping the knife from descending. Then… the yellow hand holding the gray one's wrist, began to squeeze. And then it squeezed tighter… and tighter… The gray Eva's left hand went limp, its wrist exploding from the pressure. The other pilot screamed, Sohn hearing it somehow. He tried to open his mouth, to say he was sorry.

"You hurt me." It was the same voice from before, not his and not the other pilots. The other yellow hand reached out and _pushed_ against the gray Eva. Though it seemed like only a small push, the other Eva was sent flying into the building across the street. Clutched in the first yellow hand, _his Eva's right hand_, was the left hand of the other Eva. That push had ripped it away from the arm it belonged too. His Eva calmly took the progressive knife from the severed hand, and then dropped the limb to the ground. The gray Eva was barely moving. Its remaining hand was twitching, but that was all. Sohn's yellow Eva slammed the blade into the gray Eva's chest, cutting through the armor and into the soft flesh underneath. The yellow Eva ripped down on the blade, slicing through the other Eva's ribs, cutting open it's lung. The yellow Eva dropped the knife and dug both hands into the open wound. Pulling the armor open, the yellow Eva reached inside the gray Eva and felt around until it felt something hard. Sohn felt it like it was his own fingers inside the other Eva. The yellow Eva wrapped its fingers around the foreign object and pulled.

"Oh God no! Please no! Stop! STOP!" In the Eva's hands was the entry plug of the gray Eva. Taking one end in each hand, the yellow Eva snapped the tube like a dried breadstick. The person inside it was still conscious. Almost casually, the yellow Eva dropped the tube to the ground. A hundred foot fall and she screamed the whole way.

***

"Ms. Mitsune Odiu."

The girl in the hospital bed opened her eye, looking at the blonde haired woman at the foot of her bed.

"I have a proposition for you."

Nagisa's Voice: The Eva pilots are finally all gathered together and this ridiculous excuse for a chapter starts to make sense! Yes, that's right; Synaid actually explains what the hell is going on and who has what job! Woo Hoo! Oh and we finally get some fan service. Jeez, when Syn said there'd be fan service, didn't think he'd mean Sohn…

**OMAKE!**

"Rei and I tried the new Evas. The gray one wouldn't allow either of us to synch with it and the yellow one, Eva Unit 14, ejected Rei almost immediately."

"And what did it do to you?"

"It allowed me to move the hand enough to give the UN inspectors the finger, and then ejected me. It's been stuck like that for the last few hours."

"Aunt Rei, can I ask you why you're so different from how you were in the original Eva series?"

"Oh that's simple, Sohn." Rei smiled down at her _nephew_. "I was on depressants in the original series."

"Ohhh…"

"They were good drugs too…" Rei got a slight far away look in her eyes.

"Uh huh…" Sohn began to edge away from his aunt.

"Happy… happy little drugs… I miss my drugs…"

"Riiiggghhhttt…."

"And the sheep. I miss the sheep. The purple sheeeeeeep."

Sohn gave up on edging away slowly and bolted for the door.

Special thanks to Chewy for this one:

"It's a... It's a... IT'S A GUNDAM! AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!!" Cannon fodder number one tried to run as the Wing Zero brought his buster rifle to bare.

"That's not a mobile suit! It's a... It's a... IT'S A GUNGAN! AND IT'S BEING PILOTED BY JAR JAR BINKS!" Cannon fodder number three tried to run as the giant thing from Star Wars appeared.

"ME'EZA GOING TO KILL YOU, OZ!"


	3. 3

Other Souls 2  
Chapter 3  
By Synaid@GameBox.net

**Author's Notes:** Now I remember where Yuriko's name came from. Yuriko Yamaguchi is the name of Ritsuko Akagi's voice actress in the Japanese version of Evangelion.

Odiu hated this feeling. Hated every inch of it and every moment she had to endure it. Loneliness. Of course, the only other choice was unacceptable. Being lonely was not fun, but listening to other people's worthless chatter was worse. Two nurses passed by her room, chattering at one another like chipmunks. While Odiu didn't catch all of the conversation, she caught enough of it.

"Yeah. We're putting on a children's program. It's going to be a lot of work but at least the children will know that God loves them. We're going to..." The conversation went out of Odiu's earshot.

"God loves them..." Odiu repeated. She got out of bed, almost forgetting to grab her crutch before she stood up. The sharp pain that went through her left leg was enough to remind her of the crutch that would likely be her life-long companion. She walked over to the open window. She'd been informed that she'd be moving into her own apartment soon.

"-the swim team. I have to get up real early and..."

Odiu wanted to scream out the door that she didn't care. That she didn't want to hear about other people's pathetic lives, even by accident.

"Are you ready for this? I have to write a paper with fifteen sources! I can't believe..."

"Maybe I should just jump." Odiu pushed open the window and leaned out. "Nobody to miss me anyway."

"And then _she_ said..."

"No, I'll just kill all of them." Odiu smiled to herself, imagining a faceless person begging for mercy as she choked the life out of them with her one good hand. "That's much more-"

"Ah, Ms. Bedlam." The doctor interrupted her homicidal thoughts. She'd never bothered to learn his name, as she really didn't care in the end anyway. "Up and about I see."

Odiu didn't respond to him in any way. An idiot could see she was up and about.

"So... How are you doing?"

"Doctor..." Her voice was low and cold. "As the person currently in charge of my medical health, _you_ had better know _exactly_ how I am doing."

The doctor sighed. That had frightened him the first time, but they'd been over this same topic a dozen times since. "Yes, well, your x-rays show that your arm is healing nicely. Your leg did not knit as it should have."

Odiu growled.

"After a while, you shouldn't have any problems. Your leg turned out better than we'd hoped, but you'll always walk with a limp and probably with a cane."

"This will not otherwise affect me?"

"That's right. You won't need a wheel chair as was originally thought." The Doctor glanced to the clipboard in his hand. He didn't want to be looking at her when he asked his next question. "That's at least some good news, right?"

He threw himself against the wall, dodging the crutch she'd hurled at him. He heard his right shoulder pop when he hit the wall. Straightening himself up he found that his right arm was hanging dead, utterly useless now that it had popped out of it's socket. Odiu's calm face did not reflect the act of violence she had just committed. "Just came to tell you that I'm releasing you. You should continue to use the crutch-"

She interrupted with a short bark of laughter.

"And remember to take your pain killers. Otherwise it's going to feel like a very long recovery for you."

"I don't take drugs."

"These aren't illegal drugs. They're just something to take the edge off the-"

"I don't take drugs." Odiu repeated, turning her back on the doctor and reaching for her spare crutch.

"Right. I'm going to go pop my arm back into its socket now, and then I'm going to get some drugs of my own."

"Go and do that, _Doctor_."

***

"So this is _It_." Shinji looked up at the cross. The last time Shinji had seen it, Lillith herself had been staked to the cross, but it had been barren for years. Now another form, though much smaller, was staked to the cross. No spear held it in place, and no divine blood poured from its wounds. "Is _It _why the Magi registered the gray Eva as an angel instead of an Eva?"

"The gray Eva has been identified as Unit 04, and yes, _he_ is why the Magi registered an angel and activated unit 14." Ritsuko tried not to look up at the cross. She desperately did not want to be reminded of what happened the last time she saw it.

"How was _It_ able to hide?"

"_He_ hid in the dummy plug, just below the pilots command chair."

"How, pray tell, could _It_ hide in the dummy plug container? _It_ is at least five times bigger than the tube."

_You would be surprised what I'm capable of, Shinji Ikari._

***

Sohn paced back and forth across the room. It wasn't particularly satisfying, as the room was cramped and rather small to begin with. The fact that Nagisa was lying in the middle of the room so as to better continue her conversation with the ceiling fan also shortened the amount of room available for Sohn to pace in.

"A week. I haven't seen dad in a week. I've been living here for a week!"

"You are... the weakest week!"

"And Yuriko... she hasn't even talked to us for more than two minutes in days!"

"She never calls, she never writes... Tsk tsk, children these days!"

"Aunt Rei stumbles in at two in the morning and is gone before we wake up..."

"Children... its midnight... do you know where your Guardian is?"

"Ritsuko hasn't even stopped by to say hi..."

"Hello? Hello? Is anybody home? Nobody here but us giant robots pilots! Gekigan Punch!"

"And you... Nagisa, you've completely lost your mind."

"Of all the things I lost... I miss my pants the most!"

Sohn jerked to a halt and looked down at his friend. "Nagisa... are you ok?"

Nagisa was silent for a moment, then sat bolt up right. "Do you hear that?"

"Hear what?"

"The phone... the phone is ringing..."

"What?" Sohn blinked.

"Sohn, are you going to answer the phone?"

Sohn wasn't usually one to play along with Nagisa, but today was already so bizarre he figured he might as well. He walked over to the phone, having to step over Rei to do it. Just before his hand touched the receiver the phone rang, making Sohn nearly jump out of his skin. Giving himself two rings to slow his breathing (and heart rate), he picked up the phone.

"Hello?"

"I need you at the briefing room in headquarters. Be there before one." Shinji was on the other end, his voice a grim echo of the once happy father Sohn knew.

"Dad, wait! I-"

"Goodbye, son."

***

Yuriko stared at the computer screen. She'd been typing pure code for eighteen hours straight. While this was the kind of thing she loved, her mind was starting to go numb. There was an odd feeling like someone pinching her in the back of her neck, and her eyes didn't want to focus. And then it hit her. It was a moment of pure clarity, allowing her to objectively see what she was doing.

"What in God's name am I doing? A query on who bought dog products on the same day they bought a cat? Who the hell thought this up?!?"

***

Shinji was laughing harder than he had in years.

"What? What's so funny?" Ritsuko looked at Commander Ikari, a slightly worried look on her face. The previous Commander Ikari would have never been caught in a giggling fit. The previous Commander Ikari wouldn't have been caught laughing at all.

"Say-" Shinji spit out, trying to halt his laughing long enough to talk, or at least breath. "Say it again!"

"Say what?"

"What you just said!"

"'She's jamming on those keys like Mozart on speed.'"

Shinji was again dissolved into laughter.

"What's so funny about that?" Ritsuko was getting a little exasperated with the younger Commander. He shook his head, both to dismiss the question and to try and to shake away the laugher, which still refused to leave him.

***

"Do you know what this is about?" Sohn sat nervously at the large table. The only other person in the room was Nagisa, who had stretched herself out on the table and was pretending to do the backstroke.

"I've been with you all day, Sohn." Nagisa switched to a breaststroke, moving her legs like a frog. "How would I know? Shouldn't you be asking your dad anyway?"

"I would if he was ever-"

"Set down." Shinji's voice interrupted from the doorway. Both the children scrambled into the closest seats. As soon as they were seated, Shinji strode to the front of the room. Rei, Ritsuko, Yuriko and a brown haired man closely following behind. The brown haired man was obviously American; the swagger in his walk and the sneer on his face gave it away. The UN logo on his left shoulder was also a dead give away, everyone knew the American's had the UN in their back pocket. Coming to a halt, the four turned and faced the two teens. "Rei, if you would be so kind..."

"Coward." Rei muttered under her breath, elbowing Shinji in the ribs. "Well, I guess you two have kind of been in the dark for the last week or so. You see, we've been working as hard as we can-"

"Some of us have, anyway." Ritsuko interrupted.

"Oh shut up! I work hard too, ya know!"

"Yes, and in tight leather-"

"That's enough." Shinji interrupted, glaring at the two of them.

"Sorry, Commander." Ritsuko tipped her head forward slightly in a sign of respect. Rei on the other hand stayed silent, refusing to look at either of them. After a moment, she continued.

"As you've noticed from your ID cards, both of you are now assigned as Eva pilots."

"Yeah, why's that?" Sohn interrupted. His father glared at him, and Sohn tried to sink under the table without looking too cowardly. In the past his father would have never done that, Asuka would have smacked him in the back of the head for it. Mainly because giving her son those glares had been _her_ job. But... she wasn't here anymore, and neither was the father that had made funny faces behind Asuka while she scolded Sohn.

"Well, while we have certain... assurances that there will be no more Evas, at least no more Evas that aren't under our control, the... _thing_ that caused Unit 04 to attack the city has forced the UN to... create a new organization, called ZELL. ZELL was brought into being as sort of another peacekeeping branch of the UN. Instead of guns or tanks, we have Evas, though. And you work for them now."

"Second Commander," The brown haired man smiled at Rei in a way that showed way too many teeth. "Why don't you inform the _children_ here exactly who 'they' are?"

"I was getting to that, _Major._" Rei glared at him for a moment. "Well, I bet you're wondering why you two got to be Eva pilots, right?"

"Well... because I piloted the yellow Eva before, right?" Sohn hesitantly responded.

"Hmmm.... That could be the answer, but then how would you explain Nagisa also getting to be an Eva pilot?"

"I-..."

"Sohn, have you ever wanted to be the boss's son?"

It took a moment to set in. _My dad is the head of NERV? No, ZELL. Dad is the Commander of ZELL?_ Like any child when their parent got a new job, Sohn then asked the obvious question. "What happened to your last job?"

"The Jet Alone project has been rendered obsolete by the new Evas." Shinji tried to keep his voice as even as possible. Listening to himself, he can remember his own father sounding like this. "Unit 04 with its current upgrades and Units 14 and 15 are decades more advanced then the Jet Alones."

"Besides, your dad didn't like the cafeteria food." Ritsuko added, brushing a stray bang out of her face. Sohn remembered that Dr. Akagi had also been working at the company that manufactured the Jet Alones.

"Be that as it may," The UN Captain stepped in front of the four others and looked down his nose at the two teen pilots, smiling again with too many teeth. "Shinji Ikari is now the Commander of ZELL. Rei Ayanami is now Second Commander or _Vice_ Commander, and also the Operations Manager. Dr. Ritsuko Akagi is the Head of Scientific Operations-"

"Again." Ritsuko spit out.

"At least you're getting paid more." Rei gave Ritsuko a lopsided grin.

"Yeah, but with inflation I think I'm actually getting paid less than I used to."

"AND Yuriko Akagi will be... what is your title again?" His voice made it obvious he was rubbing it in.

"They didn't give me one." Yuriko muttered.

"She'll be my direct assistant and replacement should anything happen to me or should I be away from my position in a time when I'm needed." Ritsuko filled in. "You'll meet most of the staff tomorrow, when you have your first Sync test. You'll meet the other pilot then too."

"Other pilot?" Nagisa spoke up for the first time since the briefing had started.

"You didn't think we'd let Ikari only pick who he wanted to be a pilot, did you?" It was more a sneer than a smile this time from the Captain. "We've procured our own Eva. Should they score higher on her Sync test, one or even both of you will be out of a job."

Sohn glanced at Nagisa, giving her a look that only years of being together could allow her to fully grasp it. _He meant that to scare us? He thinks we're worried about losing our jobs piloting those monsters? _

_I guess so._ Nagisa shrugged her shoulders.

Ritsuko stepped in front of the Captain, leaning slightly forward and smiling. "Ok, you two can go now. Try and get some sleep tonight, it'll help your Sync scores."

"Ok Rits- I mean, yes Dr. Akagi." Sohn stood and bowed slightly to the group. Nagisa gave a salute that Hawkeye Pierce would have been proud of. Together the two of them made their way to the door. Opening, Sohn was the first out, followed quickly by Nagisa. She had to follow him quickly as her eyes were rolling in different directions, almost spinning in their sockets, and she was getting a little confused about which way was out.

"Hey guys!" Yuriko called out. "Wait-" the door slid shut behind Nagisa, "... up." _Why didn't they wait for me?_

"Well those two were just the vision of restraint. Especially the girl with blue hair." The Captain's sneer was so big it made his nose look crooked.

"Good day, Captain." Shinji turned and exited out another door, followed by Rei and the others, leaving the Captain alone in the meeting room.

"Ikari..." The Captain glared at the closed door. "I will have my revenge, one way or another..."

***

"They seem to have taken it well." Rei spoke up. They'd been walking in silence towards Commander Ikari's office since leaving the meeting room.

"No, they didn't." Ritsuko spoke up. "Nagisa acted... more focused than she usually does. Her usual antics were forced this time. And Sohn... He was in shock. Didn't you notice how the two just sort of left. Didn't even hear Yuriko call out to them." Ritsuko turned behind her to speak with Yuriko. "Dear, I hope you didn't... Damn."

"What?" Rei turned and halted, noticing that Ritsuko had also stopped.

"Yuriko, when did she separate from us?"

Rei stopped and glanced around. "You know... that's a pretty good skill she's developed."

"Damnit."

"What's wrong? She's just a girl. How much trouble could she possibly get in?"

***

Yuriko lied on her side, her back against the wall. The lights had been smashed in the room, only the most minimal of repairs having been completed on the former NERV headquarters. It didn't matter to Yuriko though, as she intended to break any lights that were on when she came into the room anyway. "They left me behind. How could they?" A small glass bubble rolled across the floor to her. She'd destroyed an ancient plastic Christmas tree with a chair when she came in, and the ornaments were still slowly coming to rest. She absently rolled the transparent ornament back and forth. "Didn't they hear me? They had to have heard me. They just ignored me. I thought... I thought they were... Sohn, Nagisa, you're supposed to be my friends..." Yuriko picked the glass ornament up, turning it this way and that, looking at the star the little bit of light in the room created at the ornaments center. "Is it me? Did I do something wrong? Sohn would tell me if something was wrong. Sohn's my friend, he'd do that for me, right?" The ornament created a second star, identical to the first but off to the side. "Nagisa... Nagisa doesn't like me, does she? She's living with him now, living together with Sohn." Yuriko put the decoration down on the floor and spun it. "It should be me. I want to live with him. He's _my_ friend, not hers. I hate her. She stole him from me." Yuriko picked up the little glass ball, the star blinking alone again. "I'll kill her, the little blue haired freak."

***

Now it was morning and Sohn had spent the night thinking over yesterday's events since the end of the meeting. Aunt Rei hadn't come home that night, but new security cards along with an itinerary and a map of ZELL headquarters had been waiting for the cousins when they woke up the next morning. The black car waiting outside had brought them straight to headquarters and escorted them to the synch testing room. Along the way they had seen no one. Not down one hallway, not in one room had their been a soul to be found. It felt weird walking around something so large and having it be so empty. He'd been kind of embarrassed, being forced to change into the plug suit hanging in his locker in the same room as Nagisa. They'd changed in separate rows, but Sohn had half expected Nagisa to stick her head around the corner at any moment. Nagisa, though, surprised him by _not_ surprising him. She'd been unusually quiet again, like the day Sohn had moved in with her.

"Na- Nagisa?" Sohn hesitantly called her name. He'd finished dressing and wondered if she was too, as little sound had come from her side of the lockers.

"Yes?" The reply was softer than he'd ever heard her voice sound. "Is there something you require, Sohn?" Nagisa's voice sounded completely different from what Sohn was used to. The way she sounded now... there was no emotion to it, no life. It was as if he was talking to some machine.

"No. I was just wondering if you were, uh, done dressing."

"I have completed dressing, Sohn."

Sohn was quiet for a moment. He half expected Nagisa to break into a song about clothes right then, but nothing came. "Should we go?"

"Yes, we are expected." He could hear Nagisa standing and walking to the doors that exited to the sync testing area. "Dr. Akagi will probably only wait for us for so long."

***

"Where are those two?" Ritsuko stalked back and forth. The UN representatives had already suited up their pilot, who was patiently awaiting the arrival of the other two pilots. "Those kids are late!"

"Calm down, Ritsuko, it's not the end of the world." Rei tried to calm the older woman.

"No, but it might lead to it. Did you see that other pilot? She's a total ditz! And an American to boot! She doesn't even speak Japanese; I already had to change the commands over to English for the entry plug. Do you know how hard it is to speak English? It's like barking! Why couldn't the Americans choose some nice sounding language like Spanish or French for their official language? It's almost as bad as listening to Asuka's German." Ritsuko realized what she'd said a moment to late. She could feel Commander Ikari's eyes boring into the back of her head from his spot on the raised dais behind her. She was saved from apologizing profusely to her new boss by Sohn and Nagisa's timely arrival.

"We're here, I'm so sorry we're late! You see I put the suit on backwards and-"

"Pilot Nagisa Ayanami, arriving as ordered."

For a moment, no one moved, no one said anything. Ritsuko and Shinji both glanced at Rei, back at Nagisa and then at each other. Ritsuko opened her mouth to say something, but found that all she really wanted to do, was scream.

"Right." Rei, oddly enough, was the first to recover. Something else strange was her appearance. She was dressed in a short red skirt with black sweater top, a short red jacket over it. Her hair was died purple and pulled back into a ponytail. "Please make your way to the cage, you'll find that your fellow pilot is already suited up. When all three of you are ready, climb into your entry plugs, and we'll begin the test."

"Umm... Miss Rei?" Sohn asked as Nagisa turned to leave.

"Yes, Sohn?"

"I was wondering... Why aren't our Eva's here?"

Rei smiled warmly at him. "Dear, it's in case one of the sync's doesn't go right and the Eva were to go berserk. When we did this originally, we were forever having to fix a wall or restraint because the Evas kept ripping out of them. So, this time we're syncing from a distance, so it'll be easier to break the link if things aren't going right, ok?"

***

"Hi! I'm a pilot like you guys. They said I get to pilot the white robot but today they told me to pilot the black robot and I'm kinda freaked because it's all mean looking and the while robot looks nicer and don't you think the yellow one is just the cutest thing ever???"

Sohn stared at the girl before him, several thoughts tumbled through his head. The first one was how she'd said all that without taking a breath. The next thought was "What did they do? Stick a five year old's head on a porn stars body?" While he had several other thoughts beyond these, one single thought drowned the others out, pushing him to simply say it out loud.

"What did she just say?"

Everything the girl had just said to him had been in English, and the only other language Sohn could understand beyond his native Japanese was German. Nagisa, on the other hand...

"She said that I will be testing with Unit 15 while she will be in Unit 04."

"Oh..." Sohn stared at Nagisa. "I didn't know you spoke English."

"I was... unaware as well." Nagisa turned and strode away towards the tube marked 14. _I shall speak with Second Commander Ayanami about this later. _

"Well, she was certainly rude but then everyone here hasn't been very nice to me except that UN guy and he gives me the creeps so I hope you and I can be friends since that other pilot just blew me off and-"

_Please let her breathe, she's starting to scare me._

"-and that Ritz-coo-coo lady is waving at us so I think we'd better get into these tube thingies and start the test so it's been fun talking to you, bye!"

Sohn still had no idea what she'd been saying but finding himself standing alone on the catwalk, he got the hint and dashed down to unit 13's tube, quickly climbing in. The noxious orange liquid poured in and he unconsciously held his breath again.

"Just allow this artificial LCL to fill your lungs and we'll be able to oxydate your blood directly." Ritsuko's face appeared on a small rectangular screen.

"Glah..." Sohn let the stuff in, swallowing just a bit of it. "I hate this stuff. How am I even able to talk with it?"

"I always wondered that too." Commander Ikari arched an eyebrow at Risuko. "Shouldn't our lungs have had to work extra hard to move the LCL in and out over our vocal cords?"

"Actually, your lungs don't move at all when they're filled with LCL." Ritsuko blinked, realizing she'd never thought it out before either, even if she did know how it all worked. "In the same way you sync up with the Eva, your mental speech and thought patters are read. You're not so much speaking as the system is reading the electrical signals from your brain that would normally activate your lungs and vocal cords and translates them into the signal we use to 'hear' you."

"Is that why you could never hear me scream whenever my Eva went berserk?" Shinji absently scratched at his chin. He needed another shave.

"Basically. There are several other factors as well, but that would be the main one."

"Wait a minute." Sohn interrupted his father and Dr. Akagi. "If it's just translation of the stuff in my brain, can't it be used so that I can talk to the new pilot?"

"It sure can." Ritsuko brushed a stray blonde hair out of her way. "In fact, your mother was almost always thinking in German whenever she piloted Unit 02."

"Patch me through."

"What?" Rei, Ritsuko and Shinji all snapped in unison at Sohn.

"Umm.... Could you open a connection between me and her, please?"

"Much better, Sohn." Ritsuko smiled and took a sip of coffee. "Just because you're an Eva pilot doesn't mean you can lapse on your manners."

"Yes, Miss Ritsuko."

"And it's 'her and I,' not 'me and her,' dear."

"Yes... Miss Ritsuko."

"Further, since I am currently serving in my official capacity, and you are as well, you should be referring to me by my last name."

"Yes... Miss Aka-"

"And I do have my Doctorate, you should address me with the title to go with it as well."

"..."

"Well?"

"Yes, Dr. Akagi."

"Oh cut it out, Ritsuko." Shinji glared at her, his hands folded behind his back. "Stop teasing him."

"Sure, ruin my fun." Ritsuko pretended to act insulted, hiding her smile behind her cup of coffee. "You were more fun to tease anyway. Sohn just goes along with whatever is said."

"So... can I talk to her?" Sohn could feel his entire face burning.

"Sure, dear, just look in her direction and think of her as being right beside you and say hi."

The window opened up in Sohn's cockpit, and the high pitched scream of a girl filled his ears, along with everyone else who had been listening. Sohn's first thought was that he had just surprised her, and that was all that was wrong. Then, he noticed that he could see the artificial LCL through the communication window. It seemed to almost be boiling...

"What the hell!?" Ritsuko dropped her coffee cup to the floor and began madly typing on her keyboard.

"Report!" Rei commanded, looking over Ritsuko's shoulder.

"The LCL pressure has been steadily increasing since the sync up began."

"Why didn't a warning sound?" Shinji asked, calmly standing off to one side, his hands nonchalantly folded behind his back.

"I don't know! It should have!"

"Can you lower the pressure?" Shinji looked out at the tube containing the UN pilot. "Preferably before she implodes."

"I'm trying!" Ritsuko snapped back. "Rei, you could help."

The two women furiously typed at their stations, trying to get the increasing pressure to stop, to force eject the entry plug, anything to keep the Eva's systems from killing the pilot. _This shouldn't be happening._ Rei thought to herself. _They're not even in physical contact with the Eva's, how is this happening? Is Unit 04... rejecting her?_

Rei's typing slowed when the pilot's screams became gurgles, and she finally stopped when the sound of muscle and bone being crushed came through the open line. Ritsuko, however, didn't stop or even slow down until the pilot's skull was crushed. She didn't even notice that it'd happened until Shinji put his hand on her should and squeezed ever so slightly.

"It's time to stop."

Ritsuko looked up at the screen that showed the UN pilot's remains. The pressure was continuing to increase, and soon there wouldn't be enough left of the young woman to fit inside the pinky finger of her plug suit.

"Looks like scrambled eggs and ham." Ritsuko missed who said it, one of the new personnel whose name she hadn't bothered to learn.

_I haven't even learned her name either. I met her, threw her in that death trap knowing what could happen, watched her die, and I never bothered to learn her name. Another child's life consumed by the behemoth we've created... And I let it happen again!_

"Ritsuko..." Shinji gently squeezed her shoulder again. She realized that Sohn had been screaming, demanding to know what had happened. Rei was trying to explain it, but every other question was answered with 'I don't know.'

Ritsuko realized she'd been crying into her own hands since the moment she'd felt Shinji. She stood suddenly and wrapped her arms around Shinji and sobbed into his shoulder.

"Ritsuko, it's ok. It's not your fault, Ritsuko."

"The children..." Ritsuko valiantly tried to choke back the tears enough to speak, even with her voice muffled by Shinji's shoulder. "I keep hurting the children, and now I've killed one."

"Everyone dies, Ritsuko." Shinji's voice went cold. "Get over it."


End file.
